with Chris from Atlanta

League #17

Week #26

As I was looking over my squad, and trying to figure out where it all went wrong, I started wondering just how much the draft mattered?  How much of my counting stats were acquired in the draft and how much were from the wire?  Did it make a difference?

This is what I found …

How Stats Were Acquired

Just over half of my 7,719 at-bats in 2008 were from players that I drafted (51.1%), a good bit below the league average (62.6%).  What does this info tell me?  It tells me that I might not have drafted as well as I thought I did.  Outside of saves, I was 10% lower than the league average for each stat.  Why is that?  I’m guessing that I hung on too long to some players and gave up too soon on others.

Before crunching these numbers, I would have guessed that most of my IP would come from Free Agents and players I acquired in trades.  I wish that were true.  I think I am going to fire my pitching scout.  Here are the pitchers I drafted:

How Not to Draft Pitchers

I knew of the risk with Francis and Lilly, and I still drafted them.  I knew that they would probably have a 4+ ERA, and I still drafted them.  Throw in Myers’ major case of ’suckiness’, and Green Machine never recovered.  My ERA was above 4.30 … forever.  Those two ‘ones’ that I earned in ERA and WHIP stuck out like a huge mustard stain.

Going into next year, I plan on drafting starting pitching before round eleven (which is where I drafted my first starter in 2008).  If that plan doesn’t work, I can always find starters out on the wire.  Or can I?

League 17 - Pitching Breakdown

Pitching sucks.  But, unfortunately, we get scored on it, so you can’t ignore it.  As you can see, the ERA and WHIP available on the wire is worse than what you can obtain from the draft or trades.  That follows the reasoning that pitchers on the wire are less talented and should allow more earned runs, hits, and walks than those that were drafted.

I’m not telling you to ignore pitching in the draft.  I’m trying to show you that pitching help is available on the wire.  If you draft poorly, like I did, you can right the ship.  The tricky part is knowing when to make the change, and I am clearly still trying to figure that out.

The View from the Middle

I’m destined to finish right in the middle of the pack, and I am wondering if my lower than average percentages for drafted players has anything to do with that?  Did my “poor” draft put me in a hole?  I looked at the top teams in my league to see if there was a pattern.  I soon realized that it doesn’t matter.

The soon-to-be-champ, Ephemerals, has percentages in the 70s for all of the hitting categories, and a surprisingly low 33.8% of their saves come from their drafted players.  The only closer he drafted was Soria.  After trading for F.Cordero and Lidge, and picking up Fuentes and Mike Gonzalez, Shain leads the league in saves.  He ran and hid after his team (The Ephemerals) rolled into 1^st place on August 31^st.  Going into Friday’s games, he had 103.5 points … 18.5 more than second place.  Domination.  Impressive domination.

The second place team, Jersey Hitmen, has percentages in the 50s for all of the hitting categories and also has a surprisingly low 17.5% for saves obtained in the draft.  Joe also only drafted one closer (Street), but fleeced me in a trade for Kerry Wood (if I ever see Jeff Franceour here in town … I’m going to punch him in the face).   He also obtained Broxton from The Ephemerals.  What he did, expertly, was play the waiver-wire to the tune of 45 saves from 11 different players.  All of this lead to a 10 point finish in saves.

The third place team, Woodland Aces, is proof that you can recover from a bad draft.  Perry had the lowest percentage of ABs (37.4%), Hits (36.4%), Runs (38.2%), HRs (43.1%), RBIs (38.4%) and SBs (43.1%) to come from his draft.  Because of this, he has the highest percentages for the same categories obtained from free agency (except for SBs, where he was 2nd).  I remember seeing Woodland down in the cellar of the division back towards the beginning of the season.  Kudos, Perry.  Very impressive job climbing up the standings.

The last place team, Milk Was a Bad Choice, had percentages in the high 60s for all of the hitting categories.  The second to last place team, Bubba Gump Shrimp, had percentages in the 70s.  This clearly indicated that there is no relationship between place in the standings and these percentages.

Great, Then Why am I Reading This?

I guess what I am trying to say is that there is no blueprint for success.  Even if you have a good draft, you have to play the wire.  It is how you play that wire that makes the difference.  Take the chart below for instance.

This is telling me that it is harder to find steals out on the wire, so I better target them in the draft.  The same goes for HRs and RBIs.

Pitching categories are very top-heavy.  You want to target the true studs, or sure things, in the 2^nd quarter of the draft (Rounds 6-14).  I waited until Round 11 to draft my first pitcher.  I think going into 2009, I will look to take a starter or two in Rounds 6-10.

Saves are hard to find on the wire, only because every opening day starter is drafted along with most of the next-in-line closers.

Another lesson I learned form this exercise is to not be afraid to drop a struggling starting pitcher earlier in the season … and also to try and reduce the chances of facing that situation by staying away from the Ted Lilly-s and Jeff Francis-es in the draft.  I’m thinking that I will target three low-risk starters and three closers in next year’s draft.  I will then go for 3-4 starting pitchers with promise in the later rounds, and, if they don’t pan out, I will not hesitate to drop them.

In League 17, there were 419 wins and 5,288 strikeouts out on the wire.  There was even 215 saves, so, if one of my closers tanks, there is hope.

Putting it all Together

I think it is going to be hard to justify keeping any pitcher going into next year’s draft.  That being said, you want the five hitters that you are protecting to ideally be balanced.  This will put you in a better position going into the all-important 6-10 rounds.

Right now, I am looking at keeping A-Rod, Crawford, Russell Martin and McCann, for sure.  I have Delmon Young, Derrek Lee, and Justin Upton, too.  I’m a little low on steals with this bunch.  I might try to swing an offseason deal.  Maybe package Martin or McCann.

Come draft time, I will target whatever hitting category I feel weak in and look to remedy that, along with nabbing a good low-risk SP or two, and at least one closer, in Rounds 6-10.  After that, I let the draft come to me.

I hope you have enjoyed my weekly column as much as I have enjoyed writing it.  See you all next year!